“How much I missed, simply because I was afraid I was missing it.” Paulo Coelha

There’s a scene in Elizabeth Gilbert’s book Eat, Pray, Love where Gilbert and a friend arrive together at a particularly beautiful place. The friend’s immediate reaction is a fretful “This is so beautiful…I want to come back here someday!” Not exactly living in the moment.

But I understand the friend’s reaction. There is something about wonderful places and times that puts me in a panic. I want so much to hold on to the beauty that I am in danger of losing the wonder of the moment…or the place. Of course, I know I’m not alone in this – not when googling “be here now” comes up with 825 million hits. Over the years I’ve learned to focus more, and practicing to “be here now” has certainly helped. But it’s still a struggle.

Bowman Lake, on the west side of Glacier, is one of those exquisite places that I just want to package up and carry with me always. Photographs sometimes help with this process, and sometimes they get in the way. But I think the pictures I took at Bowman Lake are actually helping. I included one in my previous post, but here are the rest:

Such beautiful photos, but even more beautiful thoughts. I do know what you mean. There are times when we’re traveling out west when I find myself feeling anxious, and start making plans in my head as to how and when I can come back again. Rather than enjoying the moment, and the experience of being in a place I love, I worry about having to leave again and how to get back again as quickly as possible. Each trip I become more and more aware of what I’m doing, and try to stay focused on “being here now.”

It’s true, we’re always borrowing the worry that we’ll forget or fail to appreciate long enough the beauties we enjoy. May we all learn to rejoice in the present enough for its own sake! Thank you so kindly for sharing this series of exquisite photos.

Very nice job of capturing the beauty of Glacier NP. It immediately reminded me of the opening credits scene in the movie “The Shining”, where the helicopter-based camera pans over St. Mary Lake with its Goose Island, continues high above Going To The Sun Hwy, showing the gorgeous vistas along the way. If anyone is interested in getting a quick overview of the scenic wonder of this park, go to youtube and type The Shining Intro into the search function.